The rich quality of Petersburg’s Federal-style architecture is elegantly displayed in the 1815 McIlwaine House, originally the home of George Jones, one of the city’s mayors. Relatively conventional on the outside, the house has an interior enriched with woodwork employing the intricate elaboration characteristic of the city’s older buildings. The parlor chimneypiece, with its flanking arched recesses, is a testament to the city’s Federal-period craftsmanship. From 1831 to 1878 the house was the home of Archibald Graham McIlwaine, an industrialist and financier. In the early 1970s, road construction required the house to be moved from South Market Street to its present site. The building was donated to the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities (now Preservation Virginia), which undertook the move and a partial restoration. It was purchased by the city of Petersburg in 1984 for use as a museum and visitors’ center until its acquisition in 2009 by a private citizen. Returned to its original residential function, the McIlwaine House underwent a painstaking rehabilitation effort that was recognized in 2011 with a Historic Preservation Award from Preservation Virginia.
Many properties listed in the registers are private dwellings and are not open to the public, however many are visible from the public right-of-way. Please be respectful of owner privacy.
Abbreviations:
VLR: Virginia Landmarks Register
NPS: National Park Service
NRHP: National Register of Historic Places
NHL: National Historic Landmark
Programs
DHR has secured permanent legal protection for over 700 historic places - including 15,000 acres of battlefield lands
DHR has erected 2,532 highway markers in every county and city across Virginia
DHR has registered more than 3,317 individual resources and 613 historic districts
DHR has engaged over 450 students in 3 highway marker contests
DHR has stimulated more than $4.2 billion dollars in private investments related to historic tax credit incentives, revitalizing communities of all sizes throughout Virginia